For decades, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) has supported the development of and access to public broadcasting in the United States, focusing on providing non-commercial, high-quality content that reaches 99 percent of Americans. Programming on National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) ranges from national news to emergency alerts to local sports events to high-end documentaries.
For much of its existence, CPB has received bipartisan, widespread support, helping it survive multiple congressional defunding efforts. Today, however, CPB’s fate is tied to a so-called “rescissions” package under consideration in the Senate.
Rescissions are a rarely used tactic whereby presidents can propose canceling unused spending previously approved by Congress. At $9.4 billion, the bill hardly offsets the costs of the $3.3 trillion Big Beautiful Bill signed into law last Friday. But it would eliminate numerous foreign aid programs, along with all $1.1 billion in federal funding for the CPB for the next two fiscal years. It could also set a precedent of Congress rubber-stamping the unilateral cuts imposed by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The bill was presented in late May, and under the rules for rescissions, it must be passed by Congress within 45 legislative days with a simple majority vote. The House already passed the rescissions package by a single vote, and now the Senate faces a July 18th deadline. This bill can pass the Senate with a majority vote, so Republicans do not need Democratic help on it.
Ending CPB funding would fulfill a years-long promise by President Donald Trump and conservative allies, who allege that public media promotes a radical, leftist ideological perspective. Yet PBS and thousands of local radio and television stations have also been swept up in this tirade, putting at risk essential educational programming for rural America and America’s children.
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The Trump White House has chipped away at public media with aspirational executive orders calling for defunding, and the termination of Department of Education “Ready to Learn” grants that helped fund PBS Kids shows like Molly of Denali and Lyla in the Loop. But the rescissions bill represents the biggest threat to public media’s continued existence.
Funds appropriated to the CPB amount to less than 0.01 percent of the federal budget, and the average taxpayer only pays $1.60 a year to support public media. The money is distributed to NPR and PBS; the television network obtains 15 percent of its annual revenue through the CPB. But a large share of CBP funding is distributed to the 1,500 locally owned member stations across the country, which allow for emergency alerts to rural populations, local news, musical and cultural events, and high school sports games without commercials.
The risk to educational media for children has seemingly been lost among the confusion, fear, and outrage. Platforms such as YouTube and Netflix, along with private television networks, carry educational content, but none can match public media’s targeted programming. Every month, PBS Kids sees 345 million streams across all its digital platforms, outlets that provide carefully developed, well-researched, accessible and inclusive shows, educational games, and activities to America’s youth.
Research has demonstrated that these resources help to increase children’s early literacy skills, mathematical knowledge, and interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) programs. A Texas Tech study found that kids who watch Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, a spin-off of the iconic Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and come from homes where they speak to their caregivers about TV, had greater empathy, could better recognize emotions, and sustained strong self-efficacy.
Viewership for PBS is widespread and crosses many divides in U.S. politics. PBS programming can reach nearly every family, regardless of income or location. According to a PBS fact sheet, 87 percent of non-internet homes and 56 percent of low-income homes view PBS, and 60 percent of the audience lives in rural communities.
PBS programming can reach nearly every family, regardless of income or location.
Public media supplies high-quality and consistent educational programming to young children who are not enrolled in school, and who otherwise would not have such learning opportunities. Some states, like South Dakota, do not have state-funded preschool programs, leading caregivers to lean on public broadcasting to support early childhood development, especially those who cannot afford or are not located near preschool programs.
“There’s nowhere to go to get a preschool education for young children in those rural areas. We have seen many, many areas that are considered child care deserts, which means that there’s many, many more children who could need care and education services than those services are available,” said Dr. Marcy Drew, Director of Education for South Dakota Public Broadcasting (SDPB). “For some folks in those super rural, super low-income areas, SDPB might be the only opportunities they have.”
Public media can fill in the gaps when it comes to ensuring that all children have access to educational opportunities, which is beyond valuable to families in areas where state funding for education is not prioritized.
In the Black Belt region of Alabama, a swath of counties that are mainly rural and have predominantly African American populations, educators and caregivers benefit from the support of Alabama Public Television (APT). Jack Williams, director of external affairs, explained that even though Alabama has some state-funded preschool options, children who are low income and rurally located still benefit from public media. “In those areas, the extra educational opportunities they get outside the classroom is pretty much limited to APT,” he said. “It would be devastating to those communities to lose this service that’s supplementing what they’re getting in the classroom.”
“It would be devastating to those communities to lose this service that’s supplementing what they’re getting in the classroom.”
Within low-income communities, regardless of location, PBS and its affiliate state networks provide valuable training for educators and caregivers, with representatives traveling to areas where they may need more support. “We go out and do in-service training, we go to conferences, we have comprehensible newsletters that send those resources to those children and caregivers so that they have access to and have time in their busy day to add to what the children need in their classrooms and facilities,” Drew said. “We work hard to meet everyone where they are.” SDPB is not alone in doing this; APT also goes into rural areas and provides teachers with updated trainings and workshops so that they may better instruct their students.
Diverse representation in educational media is also at risk. Children see themselves represented in programs such as Molly of Denali, America’s first nationally distributed show with an Alaska Native in the leading role. Sara DeWitt, the senior vice president and general manager of PBS Kids, said the show and others like it have had a tremendous impact: “We heard from a lot of Native American children across the U.S. that felt very seen by that show and really excited to see a character who looked like them.”
DeWitt said that Native American children were not alone in appreciating the show—its themes resonate with children across the country. “One of my favorite stories was hearing from the general manager of our station in Arkansas of how she was getting a lot of letters from families saying how much they love this show because it was the first time they’d really seen rural life depicted in a way that felt very realistic to them.”
When the Department of Education terminated CBP’s 2020-25 “Ready to Learn” grant, some research on the efficacy of programs created with that funding ended as well. If all federal funding is lost, it will become extremely difficult, if not impossible, for PBS Kids and the stations that distribute educational content to gather feedback and conduct research.
“All of these kinds of research results are things that we published to the field, to the industry, so that content creators at any network—anyone who’s creating content for kids—can benefit from it, can understand what works and what doesn’t based through these federal dollars,” said DeWitt.
To make up for the loss of federal funding, it is possible that PBS member stations will turn to support from private entities. Providing programming without commercials is a key feature of public television and its children’s programming. Shows and games that require sponsorship from corporations dominate the landscape of educational content.
“The loss of federal funding means that corporations and private ventures can swoop in and change the business model of this media,” said Rachel Franz, the early childhood advocacy program director for Fairplay, a nonprofit organization that works to help children prosper in a world dominated by marketing pitches. “It would change from media that honors kids and families to media where profit is the priority, and we’ve seen that this push for profit often comes at the expense of kids’ well-being.”
Since its conception, PBS Kids has prioritized what’s best for children, said DeWitt. “Our mandate is to put the best interests of kids at the center of what we do—really thinking about every piece of what we create, what needs to be created, thinking about how a child can benefit from it free from the pressures of the bottom line, free from any kind of influence, to be really focused on the kid.”
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Politicians on both sides of the aisle have expressed concerns about defunding CPB. During a June 24 Senate Appropriations Committee hearing, Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, testified about the provisions of the rescissions bill. Multiple senators on both sides of the aisle asked Vought how cuts to CPB funding would affect public media in their states. In response to Sen. Martin Heinrich’s (D-NM) concerns about the loss of funding for rural public media stations in New Mexico, Vought claimed, “There is ample time for them [local stations] to adjust … Our view is that they should be more judicious with where they are paying for content that is no longer a need.” What exactly “being more judicious” means when it comes to providing essential content to local communities is not a mystery: the Trump administration is attempting to do away with programming that they deem unnecessary.
After the hearing, Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), chair of the Appropriations Committee, vowed “fundamental changes” to any rescissions bill that reached the Senate floor, which would force a re-vote in the House. Collins’s concerns were mostly targeted at the foreign aid provisions, but she later said she wanted to protect all public media funding except for NPR. Sens. Mike Rounds (R-SD) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) have also expressed discomfort with killing CBP funding.
Support for continuing to fund CPB has ramped up in the past few months, with Americans across the country engaging in advocacy efforts. Protect My Public Media, a large action network, has been campaigning against the recession package, collaborating with over 400 public media stations, national organizations, programming producers, and individuals. It has released television ads in several Republican states with senators who may be on the fence.
The group recommends that viewers and listeners assist in the fight against pulling federal funding for public media by calling and emailing their lawmakers, especially if they sit on the Appropriations Committee. Protect My Public Media is also soliciting stories from viewers to express what public media means to them.
“We know that we reach a lot of kids and that we reach them in the ways that they can access content,” said DeWitt. “We know that parents want their kids to be successful in school and we know that parents believe that PBS Kids is something that can help with that.”